In October 2020, Dublin Theatre Festival invited theatre makers based in Ireland to apply for awards to fund the development of new ideas for performance that respond to our contemporary moment and that navigate the challenges to presenting live work during a pandemic.

Dublin Theatre Festival invited theatre makers based in Ireland to apply for awards to fund the development of new ideas for performance that respond to our contemporary moment and that navigate the challenges to presenting live work during a pandemic.

The COVID-19 crisis continues to have a far a reaching personal, political and environmental impact and has made precarious the encounter between artists and the public that is fundamental to liveness. It has also amplified existing inequalities and revealed the fragility of many of our systems, including the performing arts ecology.

At the same time, we believe that there is an urgent need for artistic responses to the situation we find ourselves in; to ask critical questions, to foster solidarity and to dare to be joyful and hopeful. With Futures, we want to give artists and their collaborators the resources to access to time, space and materials to develop ideas.

We are delighted to share the chosen projects.

Glimmer from Robyn Byrne and Rachel Ní Bhraonáin is a cheeky, flamboyant and uplifting spectacle piece – combining live dance, screendance, visual art and design.

The Application from Gina Moxley and Luca Truffarelli is a film about freelance artists making funding applications in this year of endless applications. It will be shown online and projected on theatres, concert halls, funding bodies, animating closed buildings. Emma Coen will produce The Application in association with Pan Pan.

Blasted is a new piece of dance theatre about desire, intimacy and sexual transgression from cultural renegades THISISPOPBABY. The piece delves into the underbelly of queer culture and queer sexuality; looking at Ireland’s chem sex scene through an amoral lens, touching on themes of identity, self-worth, isolation and family, asking when does an underground scene become a community crisis, and when is it time for the party to end?

The creative team includes Phillip McMahon and Philip Connaughton.

Gorm TV is an up and coming dialogue based web series that aims to tackle the un-discussed social issues that affect the multicultural generation in Ireland. With a multi-ethnic and multidisciplinary team, Gorm TV aims to dissect and challenge social issues through discussion based forums from varying perspectives and live performances which ultimately serve to build solidarity and a common ground.

The founder of Gorm TV is Mamobo Ogoro and will be joined by Hala Jaber, Olufunmilayo Jinadu, Sandrine Ndahiro and Tobi Omoteso.

Poguemahone by renowned author Pat McCabe tells a whirling, winding story of an Irishman in 1970’s London, and is told in the style of beat-poetry, weaving music and a vast array of characters throughout its deeply-layered narrative. The performance is more like a piece of music. It has slow and fast movements; beautiful sad lyrics and roaring pub sing-a-longs.

TAKE ME SOMEWHERE combines the intimacy of a performer/audience live connection and the visceral experience of immersive audio for an audience in a safe and caring environment. Turning our new reality on its head with a world of sound, story and the touch of another.

Creative team: Hanna Slattne, Anna Newell and Peter Power.

A young man called Joseph Grace is catapulted from a small farmhouse on the bogs of Meath to the grim trenches of WWI. Deirdre Kinahan’s dazzling new play follows his extraordinary odyssey through the brutality of war, the sexual liberation of the Weimar Republic, the suffocating conservatism of mid-twentieth century England, and back again. It is a battle for survival through war, discrimination and intense political upheaval, told with humour, humanity and a poetic eye for truth.
nFrom Landmark Productions.

Seaside Conversations from Jody O’Neill and Carl Kennedy will begin with a series of multi-sensory encounters by the sea with adult disability service users in Bray, County Wicklow. Led by the participants’ responses and input, Jody and Carl will then develop a piece of work that makes visible and articulates their experiences during the time of Covid-19.

No Woman is an Island is an investigation into the contemporary experience of solitude and isolation, asking whether in a highly connected world we can embrace solitude as being alone well.

No Woman is an Island is supported by the Galway City Council Áras Éanna Residency [in absentia] 2020.

Róisín Stack – Writer & Performer

Ann Blake – Director

Jane Deasy – Composer

Lou Cope – Dramaturg

Adriano Cortese – Mentor

Brokentalkers will develop a new music/theatre production in collaboration with accordionist Danny O’Mahony and composer Valgeir Sigurðsson. Combining the contrasting musical styles of O’Mahony & Sigurðsson with Brokentalkers distinct blend of biography and breath-taking theatricality this production takes inspiration from Danny O’Mahony’s personal relationship with his craft and his dedication to the preservation of traditional music whilst simultaneously grappling with the weight of tradition, the capriciousness of memory and the artist’s need to express himself.

Written & Directed by Feidlim Cannon & Gary Keegan,

Creative Producer Rachel Bergin

Composition by Danny O Mahony & Valgeir Sigurðsson

This work is supported by an Arts Council Theatre Commission Award.

Saothar an ama a chaitear, a chailltear agus a roinntear. Macnamh ar cumha, cuimhneacháin agus tadhall. Snáithe a theilgean i ór 24 carat chun an spáis idir orainn a chomorádh. Chiallaíonn ‘Pandemic’ ‘an uile dhuine’ agus chorraigh sí cách.

The labour of time spent, lost and shared. A meditation on grief, memorial and touch. We will cast a 2m golden thread in 24karat gold to mark the state sanctioned space between us. ‘Pandemic’ meaning ‘All People’.

Creative team:

Choreograoher/ Performer- Ruairí Ó Donnabháin

Producer – Maura O Keeffe

Helle Helsner – Mentor

Siriol Joyner – Dramaturg

Image: Debbie Scanlon

Aithníonn an eagraíocht an chabhair mhór a thug tacaíocht airgeadais Údarás na Gaeltachta agus An Chomhairle Ealaín trí Ealaín na Gaeltachta, chun an togra seo a chur ar bun.

In a town where it rains (more than it doesn’t rain), a girl, made from paper, spends her days dreaming of going outside. MADE FROM PAPER (written by Clodagh Mooney Duggan and directed by Nessa Matthews) is a show for younger audiences about the courage it takes to finally step outside and follow your heart.

Writer: Clodagh Mooney Duggan

Director: Nessa Matthews

Stage Manager: Sinéad Purcell

Performer: Meg Healy

Performer: Siobhán O’Callaghan

Lighting Designer: Bill Woodland

Set and Costume Designer: Naomi Faughnan

Assistant Set and Costume Designer: Ebun Oladeru

Composer: Aoife Fitzpatrick

Image Credit: Jill Matthews

In association with O’Reilly Theatre.

For younger audiences.

From Painted Bird and Fiona McGeown: “10 years ago my dad fell into a slurry pit and nearly died, or so he says. We only have his story to go on and there is so much more he won’t say”. This project explores how stories born from disasters, provide a way for us to arrange the possibility of death, of our own death, which we do, even though it is just an arrangement.

This work has been supported through the Arts Council Theatre Project Awards.

Creative Team: Fiona McGeown, Rob Moloney, Jutta Geike, Thomas Conway, John Galvin